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Resultsat theTop

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BARBARA ANNIS I RICHARD NESBITT

Resultsat theTop

USING GENDER INTELLIGENCE

TO CREATE

BREAKTHROUGH GROWTH

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This book is printed on acid-free paper. ♾

Copyright © 2017 by Barbara Annis and Richard Nesbitt. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New JerseyPublished simultaneously in Canada

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Barbara Annis:To my husband, Paul Reed Currie, whose amazing support, love, and integrity I

always admire and treasure. And to my wonderful children, Lauren, Sasha,Stéphane, and Christian; my bonus children, Zachary, Kelly, and Jeremy; and my

grandchildren, Colin, Cameron, Alaia, Brydan, Jake, Riley, and Grayson.

Richard Nesbitt:It is with deep gratitude and the utmost appreciation that I dedicate this book to

the many courageous and honorable women and men whom I have had theprivilege of working, learning, and growing with throughout my career. Their

knowledge, integrity, and perseverance have taught me so much for which I ameternally grateful. I would like to thank my co-author Barbara Annis, who I have

known, worked with, and respected for over two decades, for helping us achieve ourvision of creating a book that speaks to men and women.

I am exceedingly thankful to my parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, anduncles for their many sage and critical life lessons taught to me during my

developing years on the farm.

I dedicate this book to my exceptional daughters, Olivia and Lillian, whocontinue to educate and inspire me each day with their wisdom and joie de vivre.

You are both a constant source of joy, wonder, pride, and inspiration.

And I am most grateful to my wife and biggest fan, Lucy, my trusted advisor andlife partner of more than thirty-four years. Her encouragement, suggestions,

guidance, and enthusiasm have kept me motivated and encouraged throughoutthe writing of this book.

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction xiii

Chapter 1 Your Wake-Up Call 1

Diversity at the Top: Correlates with Better Performance, 1How We Came Together, 3Barbara’s Wake-Up Call, 4When I Became a Real Manager of People, 6The Diversity Money Pit, 7What Makes the Difference, 9Brushing Your Horse, 10Lack of “Gender Success” Is Costly, 11This Is Your Toolkit, 11Endnotes, 12

Chapter 2 The Business Case for the Advancement of Women 15

“Let’s Do It!”, 16Defining Superior Performance, 17Adding Women to Boards, 18The Reason for the Improvement in Financial Performance, 20The Future of Leadership, 20“Values Don’t Matter If We’re Not Making the Numbers”, 21Endnotes, 31

Chapter 3 Ascent of Neuroscience 35

Equal Does Not Mean the Same!, 36The Ascent of Neuroscience, 36The Domino Effect, 36Bell Curve of Gender Tendencies, 37The Ability to Peer More Deeply, 38

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viii CONTENTS

Sex Differences in Brain Structure and Function, 40Sex Differences in Hormonal Composition, 44The Breakthrough That Knowledge Brings, 45Endnotes, 46

Chapter 4 Ascent of Women 49

The First Long Step, 50Women Joining Business Clubs, 51Cultures Clinging to Tradition, 52The Ascent of Women, 52An Economic Necessity Versus a Choice, 58Areas Where Glass Ceilings Still Exist, 59Endnotes, 66

Chapter 5 Ascent of Men 71

Men Accelerating Change, 71The Evolution of an Attitude, 75Evolution in Our Thinking, 80Are We Stalled or Advancing?, 81The “Aha” Moment, 83Breaking the Mold, 84Endnotes, 87

Chapter 6 Millennials: Facts and Fictions 89

It’s Not a Generational Issue, 89How Much the Same We Really Are, 96Why Women Are Needed in the Tech Industry, 97It’s Not a Generational Issue, 99Endnotes, 100

Chapter 7 What Works and What Doesn’t 101

We’re over the Tipping Point, 103How to Create Sustainable Change, 104What Works and Why, 105What Doesn’t Work and Why, 108Other Best Practices, 112Critical Mass and Critical Mindset, 114Endnotes, 114

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Contents ix

Chapter 8 The Role of the Board 117

Lack of Mentoring, 118Stereotypes in Business, 118Richard’s Story: Boards in the 2008 Financial Crisis

and Their Gender Composition, 119The Quota Experience in Norway, 121Picking the Best Candidate Remains Vital to Success, 122It May All Start with the Board of Directors, 123Humans Follow Role Models, 126Role Models Are Leaders, 126Women’s Participation in Management and on Boards, 129Men’s Beliefs and Behaviors Are Changing…Slowly, 130Endnotes, 131

Chapter 9 Measuring Commitment 133

A General Model for Gender Diversity in ManagementInformation Systems (MIS), 134

Defining a Model for Gender Diversity, 135Gender Diversity Model for Management Information

System (MIS), 138Constructing a New Gender Propensity Index©, 142What Happens Next?, 143Endnotes, 144

Chapter 10 How to Rid the Plumbing of Bias 145

Gender Parity in New Graduates, 146Sourcing, Job Descriptions, and Interviewing, 146Nine Levers for Creating Gender-Intelligent

Organizations, 150Areas Where Systemic Biases May Form, 152Just Go in There, 153Having a Hard Time Getting Women to Join, 154You’re Creating a Lose-Lose Scenario, 154Fixing the Plumbing, 155Endnotes, 156

Chapter 11 What the Future Holds 157

How Engaging Are Your Engagement Surveys?, 157Brushing the Engagement Survey Horse, 159

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x CONTENTS

“Are We Being Gender Intelligent about This?”, 159Challenging Tradition, 160Feminine Values in Financial Services, 161Why Does Gender Success Elude So Many Businesses?, 162What If We Do Not Act?, 163Steps to Gender Success, 165The Long Ascent, 167Endnotes, 168

Index 171

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank John Fayad, our senior editor for Results at the Top.This book is only possible through his diligent efforts and valuable advice

overmanymonths. He is a true advocate for inclusion and diversity who is makingit happen in business every day.

BARBARA ANNIS

I wish to acknowledge the many men and women with whom I have workedclosely over the years for their deep commitment to creating a more gender-intelligent world for us, for our children, and for each succeeding generation.

My deepest appreciation to the women leaders and staff at the Women’sLeadership Board, Harvard Kennedy School. I am honored to partner with youin your commitment to creating a world where men and women are equallyvalued and respected in all aspects of economic, political, and social life.

I also wish to recognize the thousands of men and women whom I have metover the years, at all levels of leadership across the globe, who want nothing morethan to find ways to work together more inclusively and productively and to findgreater success and satisfaction in their careers and in their personal lives.

Finally, I must recognize the organizations, both past and present, with which Ihave worked so closely for their amazing, dedicated men and women in positionsof leadership creating cultures of Gender Intelligence.

RICHARD NESBITT

My thanks go out to those who read earlier drafts of this book and provided theirvaluable comments. I would also like to thank my fellow professors at Rotmanwho gave me advice and helped me head in the right direction. In particular, Iwould like to thank Tiff Macklem, dean of the Rotman School of Management,and Mihnea Moldoveanu, vice dean, Rotman School of Management, for theirsupport and guidance.

Important parts of my education in diversity have come from my work withWomen in Capital Markets. This organization continues to do tremendous workin improving our financial markets through greater inclusion.

I would also like to thank my assistant, Bernadette Fernandes, who hassupported me for many years in my various projects, including Results at the Top.

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xii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My gratitude to all of the contributors, who are too numerous to name. Theyhave provided their stories from their real-world experience for inclusion in ourbook. From them we are able to learn about what works and what doesn’t work.They are role models for all of us who seek to improve our organizations. Speak-ing of role models, I wish to acknowledge the visionary male leaders who haverecognized the economic power of men and women leading together, and whoare actively involved in advancing women in leadership.

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INTRODUCTION

For decades, the burden for achieving parity in leadership, whether inbusiness, education, or government, has been placed squarely, and wrongly,

on the shoulders of women alone. There are few if any books written specificallyto men on gender diversity and what men can and should do to support andchampion the advancement of women into leadership roles.

Nevertheless, we see an entirely different phenomenon that’s taking placetoday and coming at us at a high rate of speed. We see an expanding realizationon the part of men—in pockets all over the globe—that sharing leadership withwomen produces superior performance in organizations. Virtually every financialstudy conducted since the 1980s on the financial performance of companies thathave women on their boards and their executive teams have proven it to be true!

Male leaders know the value. What they don’t know is how to engage and besupportive in advancing women. Results at the Top is the first book of its kindwritten primarily—though not exclusively—for men, showing them exactly whyorganizational performance is better and how to get on board.

Results at the Top will be of high interest to women as well, for by speakingto men and making known their thoughts and the reasons for their behaviors, wereveal to women how to best communicate and interact with men in the work-place, and in many other aspects of life.

We’re embarking on a new level of achievement in the pursuit of women inleadership, and this book is recognition of that achievement and points directlyto the successes gained.

Our title, Results at the Top, speaks to that success and the intersection of thethree transformational events happening in countries across the globe that arebringing about that acknowledgment and success. These events are culminatingin the rise of companies’ Gender Intelligence quotient, shareholder value, andthe broader measures of superior corporate performance.

• The ascent of neuroscience and our expanding awareness of the distinct yetcomplementary natures of men and women

• The ascent of women in dominating education and moving into positionsof leadership

• The ascent of men in their recognition of and advocacy for women inleadership

xiii

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xiv INTRODUCTION

This book fixes its sights on these three elements, with particular focus on theascent of men, and spotlights trends in their attitudes and behaviors as well astheir successes in advancing women in the organizations that they lead. It’s also abook in which men can discover more about themselves, how they tick, and why.Unlike so many books and articles written about men, we are not here to placeblame, but to understand men’s strengths and contributions and how they differfrom those of women.

Nor do we address issues such as how women should conduct themselves tobe most effective in today’s companies. Previous books on this and related topicsare plentiful and are usually addressed only to women, or to some vague blend ofmen and women.

Today, women equal or outnumber men in universities, law schools, andmedical schools, and for the first time in the United States, in 2009 womenreceived a greater percentage of doctorate degrees. They’ve represented nearlyhalf the workforce since the 1980s and influence almost 80 percent of consumerpurchases globally. They are joining the ranks of business entrepreneurs inincreasing numbers—on average, running more financially successful smallbusinesses than their male entrepreneur counterparts.

But there is one outpost where women are a distinct minority, and not by theirown choice—in the senior leadership teams and boards of public corporations.Despite the acclaim given to a few high-profile female CEOs, around 90 percentof companies today are still led by men.

The discrepancy has not gone unnoticed. Gender diversity is one of the hottesttopics in business today. Why are women not advancing at the pace they wouldlike? Why do regulators feel it necessary to mandate gender diversity in publiccompanies? Why, after forty years of mandates, are women still only one out offive on executive teams and one out of ten as CEOs?

Results at the Top brings to business leaders—male leaders—a “dollars andcents” rationale and proven reasons to change their attitudes. Our book deliv-ers proof of a virtually universal relationship between the presence of women onboards and in senior management teams and improved corporate performance.And it proposes a series of concrete steps that corporations can and should taketo promote greater gender diversity at each stage of the career ladder.

We offer groundbreaking insights into what will motivate companies to hiremore women into senior management and appoint them to more board posi-tions. We examine the relationship between the number of women on a board ofa company and the number of women on the top management team of that com-pany, advancing a new method of evaluating diversity in a company’s leadershipcalled the Gender Propensity Index©, or GPI©.

Do a company’s policies and leadership behaviors indicate the likelihood ofnew women being added to management and boards? Will this lead to superiorperformance? Many stakeholders want to know the answers to these questions,from the companies themselves to their employees, their new hires, and theirshareholders. Itwill alsobeof interest to regulators andother government agencies.

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Introduction xv

Results at the Top discusses how men should respond to these challenges andhow men and women can work together to achieve the common goal of runningbetter organizations. We address the importance of measurement and action torealize enhanced performance through gender diversity and how organizationsshould rid their “plumbing” of bias as a first and most critical step.

We’re on the crest of this tidal wave and beginning to see the effects ofgender-balanced leadership on the productivity and financial performanceof companies. In time, this wave will carry over onto the global economy andinto governments around the world.

Countries are beginning to realize and embrace, as equals, their greatestundervalued and underdeveloped economic resource—the female half of thepopulation. We believe the engagement of women in developing countries fortheir balanced voice in business and government will be one of the greatestbreakthroughs for humankind in the twenty-first century.

The solution right under our noses is in bringing the best brains of both menand women together to create a better, more stable world—both economicallyand socially. Imagine how different our world would be right now if women hadbeen at the table just in the last fifty years.

Our hope is that, with our book, we can encourage and influence just 10 per-cent of the male leadership in companies around the world and accelerate theprogress that’s already been made. Our hope is that Results at the Top will be awake-up call for more men to get on board and give rise to an evenmore powerfulmovement forward.

We believe that if we can get this right, we could achieve real progress in asingle generation.

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Chapter 1

YOUR WAKE-UP CALL

Let’s put it on the table right at the onset. We believe—and what’s more, webelieve we can prove—that if you want your business to perform at its peak,

you must hire and promote women alongside men into management and electthem to your board of directors.

How we can possibly be doing the best for our businesses if we hire andpromote from only one-half of the population? This question has been out thereforever, including back when women were not even considered full citizens.Asking this question has not led to the experience that most women and manymen want, which is a full place for women alongside men in management andon boards. Other authors have tried to argue that women have superior skills(at least in certain areas) and this is the reason they should succeed in business.How is that argument working for change? Not so well.

We need to make a case that is provable based on evidence from an over-whelming number of experts in the field—a case that matters to those in positionsof power. Who are they? Why—men, of course. This is the challenge that manywho have tried to create change have been unable to resolve.

DIVERSITY AT THE TOP: CORRELATES WITH BETTERPERFORMANCE

For over twenty years, a growing body of research has demonstrated that compa-nies that embrace diversity in general—and gender diversity at the highest com-pany levels in particular—enjoy superior corporate performance. The evidenceis globally relevant. It applies as much to China as to the United States and asmuch to Canada as to the United Kingdom or any other country.

1

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2 YOUR WAKE-UP CALL

Acting to achieve optimal corporate performance, or as some statutes require,“acting in the best interests of the corporation,” requires boards and managementto adjust the balance in their firm to achieve the right mix of men and women inleadership roles.

However, some believe progress by corporations in this area has stalled of late.Despite the acclaim given to a few high-profile female CEOs, progress in promot-ing women to senior management roles has slowed inmature economies.Writingrecently in The New York Times, Philip N. Cohen noted that, “The movementtoward equality stopped [in 1994] and it hasn’t changed much since.”1

Men still dominate senior management and boards, with women representinga little more than a token presence. There is no question that women feel “leftout” and frustrated, as is suggested by the title of aHarvard Business Review article,“Women in Management: Delusion of Progress.”2

However, if you consider that the aim is a fundamental change in the waymen and women interact with each other at work, we can see progress continuingglobally with distinct regional dynamics.

That’s the bottom line of our book. And unlike other books written today onthe topic of advancing women, this is not another “your journey to diversity” book.We’re offering more than that. We know what works and we’re going to show youhow to do it. We’re going to share breakthrough insights, pinpoint the specificareas where you need to focus your attention, and give you the tools to makethings happen.

This book is unique in another way as well. There are few if any books ongender diversity targeted specifically to men and what men can and should doto support and champion the advancement of women. For decades, the bur-den for achieving parity in leadership, whether in business, education, or gov-ernment, has been placed squarely, and wrongly, on the shoulders of womenalone.

That’s changing. We see a growing realization on the part of male leaders allover the globe that women in balanced leadership with men leads to a biggerbottom line. These leaders are personally getting involved and seeing that theirmanagers at all levels are walking the talk as well.

Men in positions of power want to see more women on their executive teamsand on their boards. Many confess, though, that they don’t know what to do tomake that happen. Many admit that they didn’t know that they personally neededto be involved. They also admitted that they are seldom if ever invited to partic-ipate in gender diversity programs. But when we share with them the contentsof this book, they’re totally receptive, supportive, and enthusiastic about gettinginvolved.

Men, you are the last piece of the puzzle in this quest for the advancement ofwomen, and this is your one-of-a-kind guidebook in how to get personally involvedand what specifically you can do.

Women, youwill findResults at the Top of huge value as well for its refreshinglydifferent insights into why men on executive teams and boards—well, men in